Is it ok to use google images

I'm still in the early stages of learning IM. I heard that it is a good idea to use relevent images on your site. I was just wondering if it is ok to use google images or are they copyright. What I mean is could I just lift an image after searching in google images and place it on my site?

google images are just images on internet. MOST of them are copyrighted, you can not use them without paying or permission. acrually, as far as I know, many people had to pay the penalty, such as $3000/image, simply because you used copyrighted images on their website.

there are some public domain image database online, search google, make sure they are in public domain. you can use these for anything, usually.

If you find an image through Google image search that you would like to use, follow it back to the original site it was gleaned from. Get the contact information for the owner of the site and either call them or send a nice email asking for their permission to use their image.

Send them a link to the site that you want to put the image on. Explain that the image will be clickable with a link back to their site which will be free advertising for them.

These are the 4 responses I have gotten when doing the same:

1. No way. Take it off your site
2. Sure go ahead.
3. You can use it as long as you pay me $xx and have a caption giving me credit for the image with a link back to my site. (Contact must be set up for both parties)
4. No response at all - in which case you do not have permission, so it is best not to use it.

Before going through this hassle, as it does take time waiting for a response, if you do indeed receive one, use a royalty free image site.

Images indexed in Google are a form of promotion for the photographer or artist.

Think of it this way: When you write an article to promote a website or product, you're hoping (and trying usually) to get that article noticed in Google and other search engines. By getting it ranked well and noticed, Google will likely send lots of traffic to the website and/or product you're trying to promote.

Getting your article indexed in Google does not automatically make that article copyright free and/or free for the taking and using by anyone who wants to, right? Hopefully everybody knows this by now - That article is still copyrighted by you and it is illegal for someone to simply copy and paste it to their own sites/materials.

The same applies to images. Google indexes and organizes them just like they do websites and articles. The photographer or artist who created the images allow Google to do this because it's a form of promotion for them.

There are plenty of people online who just want to share their work, skills, knowledge or talents - writers and website/blog builders as well as people who draw, paint, photograph and so on. In those cases the people who create the materials may not care who uses it or how.

There are others however, who do these things for a living. They write articles, books, websites and so on as a way to earn money. And the SAME thing applies to artists - photographers, painters, etc create these things to earn money from them. These items are actually their PRODUCTS that get sold.

So just taking images from the Google image search area could mean you're stealing someone's products and livelihood.

Since Google does not actually own the content itself (text or images) they cannot give you permission to use anything in any given way. They can only tell you "we found this here, go take a look". The owner of the content - again text or images - is the only person who can tell you if you're allowed to use that content, and how.

And to be on the safe side, since this is often mis-understood: Royalty Free is NOT the same thing as free.

A royalty is an ongoing payment. If you're familiar with residual affiliate programs, the concept is the same: You continue getting additional payments based on either a time span or number of uses.

Timespan royalties are like monthly or yearly subscriptions - a person has to continue paying each month or each year in order to keep the service.

A usage royalty limits how many places or times you can use a given license for something. You see this with some types of software: You buy a license that allows you to use the software on just ONE computer or ONE website. If you want to use it on additional computers or sites, you have to pay additional licensing fees.

Royalty based photo/image/artwork fees are the same. You have to pay additional money to use it in additional places or ways.

Royalty free means you only pay for the image once. You still have to pay for it though. That one time payment gives you the license to use it as often as you'd like, and/or in as many ways as you'd like. Sometimes there are restrictions or limitations and sometimes there aren't, but the point is you still have to pay for a license to use the image. It's not free of cost, it's just free of future payments and costs.

And to be on the safe side, since this is often mis-understood: Royalty Free is NOT the same thing as free.

Good distinction, GuruGazette. The reason why I recommend people add the search query "royalty free" (besides having access to images they pay for) is because many of the serps will includes images that you CAN use for free. Some of them will be public domain and some of them will be from royalty free image providers that also provide FREE images.

i suggest one of the stock sites:
istockphoto.com
bigstockphoto.com
or the great free one:
sxc.hu
(although you need to email the artist for permission!)
Also... most of wikipedia's images are copyright free. Just click on the image you want, and scroll down, there should be a licence there!

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